fish_finder Posted June 8, 2011 Report Share Posted June 8, 2011 (edited) I had the last week off, and headed up to Grey/Bruce for my annual pilgrimage to the area. Beautiful as always! I left Guelph in the sweltering heat last Tuesday. It was just as hot when I arrived. Luckily I had cold beverages in the cooler waiting for me. :cool: The river was surprisingly low when I arrived. There were countless smaller fish willing to come out and play, which is fine and dandy, but I like big fish! When the water is low and clear, the big guys hunker down and hide in some pretty tight spots making it a game of lucky casts into tight cover. When I heard the forecast for Saturday, I was pretty pumped! Tha Riva Tha Riva - Almost as misty as my mind on the first morning at dawn Lets start with the bugs.... There were at least 5 species of mayflies out and about. Hatches were pretty consistent throughout the days with sulphurs, grey foxes, green drakes and more coming off. Most evenings had decent spinnerfall events happen between dusk and about an hour after dark. A couple nights it just got too cold and the bugs, as well as the fish, disappeared. Grey Fox Duns Grey Fox Spinners - These made up the heavy spinnerfalls. Thousands of bugs in the air. I wasn't able to get any decent shots of the clouds of bugs unfortunately. Then my favourites. Giant Green Drakes. These massive mayflies are a key indicator of a healthy stream. They've been on decline in many streams in southern Ontario for a long time now. Fortunately Grey/Bruce still has a very healthy population in most rivers making for some awesome surface action! Green Drake Duns Green Drake Spinners. When these flies molt into their spinner stage a couple of days after hatching, they look entirely different. The change they go through rivals any other mayfly species in my opinion. I did manage a few shots of these guys flying around. They're hard to miss! Aside from the mayflies, there were plenty of stones, caddis, cranes, dragon and damsel flies as well. Mottled Stonefly Damsel Cranes doin tha deed! The fish were plentiful. As I mentioned, the conditions were hot, bright and tough to start, so we'll start small I suppose. They might be small, but they were loving mouse flies when there were no bugs on the water I'm not sure why, but the brookies were not as plentiful as other years. Pressure on the stream may be on the rise, not sure though. Its pretty secluded water, and I don't see many people in here. I blame the slightly warmer water temps this year. Bigger flies were producing bigger fish. During the low light of dawn and dusk I was tossing some pretty big streamers. Zoo Cougars, Matuka Leeches and a couple of Sculpin patterns were what produced larger fish... Once the storm hit on Saturday, the river rose a good 6 or 8 inches, and muddied up a bit. Always a good thing when you are near big browns. Getting at the bigger fish requires a very loud, violent retrieve of the streamer alot of the time. I spent a couple of days filming and fishing with Ken Chandler a couple of weeks back. The knowledge I gained from those couple of days chasing brookies and huge browns paid off on this trip. I've been fishing streamers far too slowly and too deep the last few years. These fish all came up off bottom to hit the fly about 6-8 inches below the surface. Oddly enough, this fish nailed a streamer in some fast, broken water at noon on one of the brightest days. Its actually kind of a funny story. I had my cousin and his kids up for a night. The kids are all fly fishing maniacs. Thing is though, they're not quite at the point that they can cast big streamers yet. We keep them on dries, nymphs and buggers when they come out. So when I pulled out a giant streamer, Shaylin looks at it and she says "what is this, some kind of joke?" Me and Justin had a good chuckle about that, but the first cast brought the big guy up to her amazement and she wanted to try it. We gave her a mouse to use though. This one was a beast. Crappy shot as the fight wasn't very long and he was still full of energy and wanted to get back to where he came from. I was lucky to get this picture actually, he flopped and disappeared as I bent down to lift him up and move him back into the water. I gotta stop there though....its painful being back in the city. I'll be back up soon though! Chasing big fat browns, and Musky within the next couple of weeks. Edited June 8, 2011 by fish_finder Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dutchy Posted June 8, 2011 Report Share Posted June 8, 2011 NIce, looks like you had a great time. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Live2fish85 Posted June 8, 2011 Report Share Posted June 8, 2011 Great Report those are some great pics. The fish are very nice to. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kickingfrog Posted June 8, 2011 Report Share Posted June 8, 2011 Beautiful fish. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
danbouck Posted June 8, 2011 Report Share Posted June 8, 2011 Love the pics! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
timmeh Posted June 8, 2011 Report Share Posted June 8, 2011 Awesome stuff. Some beautiful fish ya got there. Like the shots of the bugs too. Interesting that you've noticed a drop in brookies. In one of the creeks I fish a couple years ago I caught nothing but brookies, but in the last 2 they've been noticeably fewer though I've found a few browns including a couple nice ones. I was wondering about water temps but haven't been measuring them long enough to really know. Have you notice anything like this in some of the streams you fish? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
asdve23rveavwa Posted June 8, 2011 Report Share Posted June 8, 2011 Very nice!!!! Love those brownies! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
alphaalpha Posted June 9, 2011 Report Share Posted June 9, 2011 Great report and some amazing pictures, thanks for sharing! -AA Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bucktail Posted June 9, 2011 Report Share Posted June 9, 2011 My 2000th post and this one is deserving of WOW great Macro shots man....thank you!!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
trapshooter Posted June 9, 2011 Report Share Posted June 9, 2011 Very nice report. Your knowledge of mayflies is impressive! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Homer Is King Posted June 9, 2011 Report Share Posted June 9, 2011 Great report. Congrats on the awesome spread of trout! Thanks for sharing your insect knowledge! I learned a lot from this post. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OutdoorDan Posted June 9, 2011 Report Share Posted June 9, 2011 Very informative bug info, and holy - you are a machine, sir. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fish_finder Posted June 9, 2011 Author Report Share Posted June 9, 2011 Awesome stuff. Some beautiful fish ya got there. Like the shots of the bugs too. Interesting that you've noticed a drop in brookies. In one of the creeks I fish a couple years ago I caught nothing but brookies, but in the last 2 they've been noticeably fewer though I've found a few browns including a couple nice ones. I was wondering about water temps but haven't been measuring them long enough to really know. Have you notice anything like this in some of the streams you fish? Hard to say. I don't find that streams with browns and brookies cause either population to suffer. Water temps play a huge factor in brook trout activity though. Not so much in the way of killing the fish. They can handle a few days of warmer water, but it really affects their activity and they basically just shut right down. Their metabolism slows, and they don't move for much. The water was pretty warm by brook trout standards the first few days. Around 67 F. Then, after the storm moved through on saturday, the water temps dropped to 63 F. By that point I was pretty dedicated to chucking out streamers 3-4 inches long and targeting bigger Browns in water that wouldnt be considered ideal brookie water. If you are noticing more brown trout activity, it could definitely be water temps. Browns like water a little warmer than brookies. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Victor Posted June 9, 2011 Report Share Posted June 9, 2011 Amazing shots of both fish and the bugs! Definitely learned alot from this post, never really paid much attention to the bugs before. thanks for sharing with us. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fish_finder Posted June 9, 2011 Author Report Share Posted June 9, 2011 Amazing shots of both fish and the bugs! Definitely learned alot from this post, never really paid much attention to the bugs before. thanks for sharing with us. Those bugs make up a huge part of most fishes diets bud! Especially when they are young. Once the fish get bigger its a bit of a different story. But when you have thousands of those bugs hitting the water laying eggs, all hell breaks loose and its a smorgasbord for even the biggest fish in the pool. Problem is, its all at night when the spinners fall. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
basketclam Posted June 9, 2011 Report Share Posted June 9, 2011 That's a real beaut' of a report. Awesome stuff. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fish_finder Posted June 9, 2011 Author Report Share Posted June 9, 2011 My 2000th post and this one is deserving of WOW great Macro shots man....thank you!!! Awesome man! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jds63 Posted June 9, 2011 Report Share Posted June 9, 2011 loved the report/pics and your attention to the bug detail. ... thanks for sharing that Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GreenCanada Posted June 9, 2011 Report Share Posted June 9, 2011 Great to hear and see your success! I really enjoyed the close ups of the mayflies. Quite impressive! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dannyboy Posted June 9, 2011 Report Share Posted June 9, 2011 Fantastic report, great photography and some awesome fish, I learned lots - thanks for sharing. Dan Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rock34 Posted June 9, 2011 Report Share Posted June 9, 2011 Wow. Some great posts right now....unreal. This may be th ebest of the best. Wow, I have not been fishing enough. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
fish_finder Posted June 10, 2011 Author Report Share Posted June 10, 2011 Wow. Some great posts right now....unreal. This may be th ebest of the best. Wow, I have not been fishing enough. Thanks Dude. Most rivers are prime right now for big browns. Get out there buddy! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Carp Posted June 10, 2011 Report Share Posted June 10, 2011 Very nice colours on those trout. Thanks for sharing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
msp Posted June 10, 2011 Report Share Posted June 10, 2011 As usual, your posts are full of great photos and big resident trout. Very nicely done ! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lionized Posted June 11, 2011 Report Share Posted June 11, 2011 Caught my first spec on a creek last week and had a tough time with it. Can't imagine pulling in a brown on a river after the rain. All envy over here! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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